Gold Coast audiobook

Published in 1980, Gold Coast is another great early crime novel from Elmore Leonard. At the heart of the story is a forty-four-year-old woman named Karen DeCilia who, several years earlier, made the mistake of marrying a mobster. She's living a live of apparent luxury on Florida's Gold Coast, but it's an empty life in which she's totally dependent on her husband, Frank. But when Frank suddenly and unexpectedly dies, Karen finds herself a very wealthy widow with a chance now to live her own life as she sees fit.Or maybe not.Frank DeCilia was a very possessive guy, and he remains so, even in the afterlife. In arranging his affairs, he left all of Karen's inheritance in a trust to be administered very frugally by his mob lawyer. And it's clear that Frank intends to control not only Karen's finance from the grave, but her social life as well.Karen is completely frustrated and at her wit's end when two different men enter the picture. One is a seriously disturbed ex-con named Roland Crowe who works for the lawyer who administers Karen's inheritance. Roland assesses the situation and decides that he'd like to move in on Karen and take possession of her and her inheritance as well.At the same time, a career criminal from Detroit named Calvin Maguire shows up in Florida. Maguire did a job in Michigan for Karen's husband and was promised $1500.00 for his trouble. Sadly, Frank died before paying off and now Maguire wants Karen to make good on the debt. Before long, all three characters are tangled up in a typically Elmore Leonard inspired plot.Gold Coast has all the traits of a good Elmore Leonard novel. The characters are off-beat and cleverly developed. The dialogue is great, and until the final paragraph, the reader has no earthly idea how all of this will be resolved. A great re-read.

This is quite an old, neglected Elmore Leonard thriller but absolutely one of my faves of the 15 or so I've read by him. As always, the dialogue crackles with authentic life and the intricate plot comes together nicely. And there's a right nasty bastard to hate through it all. Top class crime writing.

I’ve read some really harsh reviews of this book here on Goodreads and I just don’t understand. This is Elmore Leonard and this is what he does. He usually has a two-bit shit-bag like Rowland, and Rowland is up there among the best two-bit shit-bags. He’s just aching to rape and kill yet he exercises a bit of restraint to further his bigger plan, which is never really revealed.I listened to the fantastic audio-book narrated by the late great Frank Muller when I was out riding my bike, and read the eBook when I was at home. If you’ve never had the pleasure of listening to one of Frank Muller’s audio performances you really need to fix that. He’s absolutely wonderful and brings the book alive. I found myself reading in the accents he gave to the various characters between bike rides. I knocked this book out in two days while also reading Redeployment by Phil Klay. I’ve been riding my fanny off these days so this has meant five hours in the saddle in two days.

2018 reread: Another book that I loved even more on a reread. It's a toss up which 1980 Elmore Leonard book I like more, this or City Primeval. I'm trying to avoid recency bias so I won't say it's this one.A vindictive husband leaves his wife with incredible strictures in his will. Several people are attempting to bilk her out of her money or to save her. It all unravels in Leonard's inimitable style. Just great character and dialog driven noir.

As with most Leonard books, the ride is so much more satisfying than the end. Elmore Leonard could literally end this book after any chapter and I wouldn't care. It was a great story and the characters spew out wonderful lines page after page. He is a poet of street language. Really enjoyed it.

When I get stuck in a reading rut, I usually go to Elmore Leonard, whose novels are dependable, quick reads that I almost always enjoy. Like most authors, there's a similarity to his works, and he fell into traps when he got lazy, but it's not like he can write Out of Sight every time.One of these traps he fell into was "pick a job, and somehow drop a criminal into it." This is how we got the high diver in Tishomingo Blues or psychic in Riding the Rap. It worked in Get Shorty with the movie producer. It didn't work so well in Be Cool, where the same character entered the music business (and the less said about the movie, the better).In Gold Coast, Maguire works for the equivalent of a Sea World. It doesn't really add much to the story. There's a lot about the financials related to a widow, and, as usual, a bunch of characters (of varying intelligence) who want the money. What I like about the way Leonard writes his characters is that they're smart, unless they're not. And when they're not, it's usually because they're blinded by greed or narcissism.The dialogue is tight as always, and the plot comes together in the end — though there was at least one element I didn't expect, thrown in more as an afterthought than anything else. It's almost as if the main character is on the sidelines the whole time.This is all to say that this is typical Leonard. As good a starting place as anything else he ever wrote, but not one of his very best. I enjoyed it.

Funny dialogue, break-neck pacing, interesting characters, bla bla bla... I'm having problems finding new ways to describe "good Elmore Leonard books" which is very ironic cuz Leonard himself had, at this point, found a good way to capitalize on his strengths on and churn out roughly the same book every year but making it a damn good time with every outing. Special note to the appearance of Roland Crowe, first appearance of a member of the Florida Crowes, those delightful screw-ups from Justified. Special special note to a tweest ending, a pretty new thing in Leonard Lore.

What a good read, I couldn't put the book down - unless forced to by work!It is easy to read, characters are either like able or you want to have a shower to remove the creepiness of them. The revenge of a dead husband putting a chastity belt on his 44 year old wife and the story that unfolds.Read it, enjoy all the way to the very last page!

Another great story from Elmore Leonard. With the mob involved, a beautiful widow in need of help, and with the help of a drifter and ex-con, she fights back. Leonard was one of the finest writers of crime fiction, and in his heyday I would say the finest.

like character of Jimmy Cap pictorialized in passage, 'Roland didn't care anything about historical sites. He got a plate of fettuccini with clam sauce, a big glass of red and some rolls, and went over to sit with Jimmy Capotorto in the Florida room that was full of plants hanging all over, like a green-house.' 'Roland said, "It's a bitch, huh, something like this? Man, you never know." 'Jimmy Cap had finished eating. He was smoking a cigar, looking out at the Bay, five miles across to South Miami. He asked Roland if the cops had talked to him.' recollect old Florida room formerly in Southern California beach bungalow remodel job i worked with Marnic. Leonard takes you back paints picture of moment in shortened chapters the opposite length of say a Massimo Carlotto lengthier insightful chapter. that said the shorter sentences create tension, at certain points in the novel, each character has their own pretty distinctive voice. read to shorten sentences from Natasa Lekic a former literary agent has her own professional editing firm. "So this here's the porpoise man," Roland said.' "Hey, partner, what do you do, play with them por-poises all day? They get excited, watching 'em? Little shithead comes in here, starts flapping his mouth." Roland held Maguire with one arm around his neck and began to rub the knuckles of his free hand into Maguire's scalp. "He, shithead, how's that feel? Give you a knuckle massage. I'll give you a knuckle sandwich I ever see you around here again. How's that feel, huh? Kinda burn, does it?"scene showed physical power dynamic he-men have over lesser specimens of manhood ; that Roland a good skillset and realistically portrayed that mafia or whomever shan't care less, if, their enforcer is a red-neck so long as job is done. nice originality that Leonard written a hint on Detroit gangsters instead of tried-and-true New York.the heroine is stunningly written and believable without resorting to one-upmanship on everything a male protagonist might've traditionally done. novel research to write a believable anti-heroine.

Now this is a solid Elmore Leonard novel. This book has it all, a hitman, the mob, a mysterious woman and a man in over his head. All classic Leonard tropes, but when he can fit them all together in a clever, entertaining way, damn, no one does it better.The plot follows Karen, a woman stuck in a loveless marriage to a mobster. But when he dies she finds herself trapped in a clause of his will forbidding her from being with anyone else hence she loses her millions of dollars. In walks our Leonard hero, an ex-con who wants to help but feels he’s outmatched, and Karen might not be the helpless victim she pretends to be.Leonard loves dialogue. Hell I love it too. It’s probably why I love his books, interesting characters having conversations about things that I thinly veiled threats and insults. It’s what he does best and this book doesn’t disappoint. Roland, the mob enforcer tasked with making sure Karen doesn’t wander, is a fun character both cunning and unforgiving you root for his demise. And when it comes it’s delightfully enjoyable.Karen is one of the rare, fully formed women, that Leonard has ever written. Now it’s no secret Leonard occasionally fell into the damsel in distress problem with his female characters but Karen kicks so much ass in this book and her last line is so great that I loved it solely for that aspect. Are the side characters more archetypes of Leonard’s adjustable personalities he likes to use often? Yes hence the 4 star rating instead of a 5 but even with that somewhat formulaic approach Leonard likes to do, its different enough and unpredictable enough to warrant a recommendation. It’s not his best work but damn it’s close.

Elmore Leonard was firing on all cylinders with this one. It's a twisted yarn like all his best work. 3 souls, lost in their own ways, Maguire, Karen, and Roland, each wanting more, and smashed together by circumstance. Karen is a mafia widow whose late husband decreed that she would never settle with another man, Roland Crowe is the Florida wild man who was tasked with the job of keeping suitors from her doors. Maguire is the man who works with dolphins, who falls in with Karen, and hopes to save her, but she is no damsel in distress. These characters and others align and misalign in a story that is so classically Leonard. The dialogue crackles and the characters are cool and knowledgeable. They try things, they fail, they try again. It was a wonderful read that I could not put down once I started it. It reminds me why Leonard was the master, and why he is often imitated but can never truly be duplicated.

Oh Elmore Leonard, one of my absolute favorites in the crime field (and his Westerns are good too). He really has a talent for keeping his writing tight, his plots compelling and fast moving, his characters well defined. There are shades of moral gray in his work but you always know the good guys from the bad guys, and Gold Coast is no exception. The story of a mob widow and two criminals who end up in her orbit in Fort Lauderdale, Gold Coast actually improves on some Leonard in the area of the romance (sometimes, maybe often, his love stories can be a little hokey), namely because… well, I can’t say why without spoiling the end (which is great). If you read enough Leonard, you start to recognize the recurring archetypes and tropes, and critics sometimes accuse him of being formulaic, but that’s never bothered me because the formula he found manages to work so well, so often, with such intriguing variations. Suffice to say that this is a prime slice of crime from Elmore Leonard, quick, funny, suspenseful, and with nary a wasted word.

Thought I was just reading another crime romp with the Elmore Leonard players — the cool guy who doesn’t wanna get involved but can’t help but see all the angles, the middle aged woman who’s seen it all but still looks better than women half her age, the stupid psychopath who seems harmless until he kills/rapes someone halfway into the story. The the end landed with such an unsympathetic thud that I couldn’t help but grin.